In recent years, for example, an ultra-thin glass or resin sheet with a thickness of 1 mm or less, or the like is used for various products. Generally, when a thin workpiece made of such a glass or resin sheet is fed (unwound) from, for example, an unwinding roll and is cut at a predetermined dimension, the thin workpiece is conveyed (fed) from the unwinding roll by a predetermined length, and the thin workpiece is cut by a cutting device.
It is necessary to prevent contamination due to adhesion of foreign substances, or the like in the case of a thin workpiece with high transparency like the thin workpiece made of the glass or resin sheet. Therefore, when such a thin workpiece is conveyed, in particular, it is preferable to convey a product quality area corresponding to a central portion in a width direction of the thin workpiece in a noncontact manner. Also, in the case of the thin workpiece, not only is simple prevention of contamination required, but also high accuracy is required for a cut dimension in many cases.
However, when the thin workpiece is conveyed in a noncontact manner, the thin workpiece is shifted at the time of unwinding or meandered at the time of conveying so that the thin workpiece is unlikely to be normally disposed with respect to the cutting device when cut by the cutting device. For example, the thin workpiece is obliquely disposed with respect to the cutting device so that the thin workpiece is unlikely to be cut to a desired shape and dimension. Thus, in the related art, when the thin workpiece is conveyed, meandering of the thin workpiece is controlled using, for example, tilting of a turn bar (for example, refer to Patent Document 1).